


On this episode of 24CH

by Milionking



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: 24CH, Behind the Scenes, M/M, Marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-07
Updated: 2016-08-07
Packaged: 2018-08-07 06:03:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7703371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milionking/pseuds/Milionking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Behind the scenes of Brendan and Alex's wedding as featured in a fictional episode of 24CH.  "24CH" is a registered trademark of the NHL and Montreal Canadiens.  No infringement of that trademark is intended and this work is purely an act of fiction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On this episode of 24CH

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Marriage with a Side of Hockey](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7564177) by [Milionking](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milionking/pseuds/Milionking). 



> I was watching 24CH on YouTube last night. For those who are not Canadiens fans, it follows the team in all their aspects both on and off the ice. I though it would be fun to imagine what a special would be like featuring the wedding of Alex and Brendan. Here it is... yes there is some French in here and I am bilingual, I translated it for you because I wanted to keep the script as close to the show as possible.

On this episode of 24CH

 

NARRATOR: The Bell Center prepares itself for the biggest event it has ever held.  What happens behind the scenes to prepare for the day

 

_A scene is set for February 12 during a home game against the Boston Bruins.  Highlights of the game are playing during the narrator portion, and then we see Brendan kneeling in front of Alex._

 

NARRATOR: It’s February 12, normally this would be a routine game against the rival Boston Bruins.  That is until there was 5 minutes to go in the 3rd period, Coach Therrien calls a timeout.

 

BRENDAN: Chucky… umm… Alex… we have been roommates and more over the past three years.  I cannot imagine us being in a better place than we are now.  I feel the time is right that I ask for your hand in marriage.  Will you marry me?

 

_The normally electric crowd is clapping yet stunned by what they are seeing._

 

ALEX (trying to hold his composure): YES!

 

_Brendan jumps up and kisses Alex the crowd now erupts as if they have been expecting this day for ages.  The camera follows them to the empty dressing room until the door closes.  The scene cuts to a camera placed behind the boards at the bench and focuses on Max Pacioretty_

 

MAX (looking over to the equipment guys): Hey we need to get the Gallys for this the right way.  They are in the room so discreetly grab a couple cases of Gatorade or water and pass it out to the team.

 

MAX (talking to his teammates): Gonna give them a shower.

 

NARRATOR:  The horn sounds on a victory for the Habs.  Brendan Gallagher and Alex Galchenyuk reappear from the dressing room to celebrate with their team.

 

MAX (pointing at Brendan and Alex): Get ‘em boys!

 

_The episode now turns to the press conference after the game._

 

COACH THERRIEN: L'ensemble de l'organisation prend en charge la relation de Brendan et Alex. Quand ils ont approché l'organisation il y a plusieurs semaines pour faire cette proposition publique, nous avons travaillé sans relâche pour en faire une réalité. Nous avons annoncé cela à l'équipe il y a quelques mois et ils ont manifesté leur appui. La performance de ce soir prouve que cette équipe peut faire des choses comme cela et ne pas être distrait du jeu que nous aimons. Nous avons une célébration de l'équipe pour se rendre à, je vais donc permettre à une seule question à se poser. (SUBTITLE: The entire organization supports Brendan and Alex's relationship.  When they approached the organization several weeks ago to make this proposal public, we worked tirelessly to make it a reality.  We announced this to the team a few months ago and they have indicated their support.  The performance tonight proves that this team can do things like this and not be distracted from the game we love.  We have a team celebration to get to, so I will allow one single question to be asked.)

 

REPORTER:  How does it feel now that your relationship is out in the open?

 

BRENDAN:  I really didn’t think it was going to be this big of a deal.  We knew that if we tried to get married privately that our relationship would become public on other people’s terms, so we are making it public on our own terms.  We are professionals that have a job to do and will do it with minimal distraction for as long as the team and our bodies will allow us to do so.

 

ALEX: I was at peace with our decision to do this although all the fanfare is the doing of Brendan. (laughter from the press pool followed)  I will love this guy forever; it is time the world knew how much.

 

_Alex and Brendan kiss in front of the press pool.  An army of photographers are taking pictures faster than machine gun fire._

 

NARRATOR:  The proposal of two teammates sets in motion months of planning behind the scenes.

 

DONALD BEAUCHAMP (Communications Director):  Nous avons passé plusieurs semaines après la proposition annonçant le soutien continu de l'équipe. Nous ne sommes pas annoncer une date jusqu'à ce que la saison était terminée parce que le calendrier de l'équipe ne nous permettrait pas de faire toute planification avec Alex et Brendan qu'après la saison a pris fin. (SUBTITLE: We spent several weeks after the proposal announcing the team's continued support.  We didn't announce a date until after the season was over because the team schedule wouldn't allow us to do any planning with Alex and Brendan until after the season ended.)

 

BRENDAN:  The focus still had to be on getting to the cup finals.  In hindsight with the short planning time we were allowed, I probably hoped we didn’t make the playoffs (laughing in his signature way).  The team offered to do all the planning for us, but we felt the wedding would lose the personal touches we wanted to add.

 

ALEX: I wanted to allow things to be more personal for our wedding, so when the team offered to do all the planning, Brendan and I discussed it and told the team we wanted to be personally involved, so no planning until summer.  We needed that time to get with our families and together to make things happen the way we wanted.

 

NARRATOR: Planning a wedding at Bell Centre poses its own challenges to the ice crew.  Even more so when the date was set, Brendan and Alex set their wedding to the day the Habs hold their first home game.

 

ICE CREW MANAGER: La fête de mariage allait patiner dans l'allée, nous avons dû faire un espace pour la famille et l'équipe d'être assis tout en permettant la glace ouverte pour la fête de mariage et Alex et Brendan. Cela aussi ne peut pas être mis en place pour longtemps à l'avance, car le tapis pour les chaises va geler la glace qui rendrait les choses difficiles une fois que nous avons commencé à mettre en place pour le jeu lui-même. Nous avons travaillé dehors avec Brendan et Alex afin que la cérémonie a été maintenue suffisamment courte pour permettre le montage et le bas à quelques minutes de la cérémonie. (SUBTITLE: The wedding party was going to skate down the aisle so we had to make an area for family and the team to be seated while allowing open ice for the wedding party and Alex and Brendan.  This also cannot be set up to far ahead of time because the carpet for the chairs will freeze to the ice which would make things difficult once we started to set up for the game itself.  We worked it out with Brendan and Alex so that the ceremony was kept short enough to allow set up and take down within a few minutes of the ceremony.)

 

CHAPLAIN:  The planning was very difficult for scripting the ceremony.  The ice crew told me that from seating to clearing out had to be less than 1 hour or we risked the carpet freezing to the ice.  This meant we had to make a ceremony of about 15 minutes.  So Brendan and Alex made their short script of promises, we did the legally required affirmation, and followed with a unity moment.  I think we retreated back down the aisle in about 17 minutes.  Only Mel Brooks in the movie “Spaceballs” made a shorter ceremony (laughing).

 

NARRATOR:  The planning over the summer takes on a more public festival feel.  Montrealers cannot resist holding a large party.  A crowd control plan had to be put in place as it was expected that a crowd of fifty thousand plus would be here.

 

Denis Corderre (Mayor of Montreal): We had to plan everything from police coverage for crowd control, a street closure plan to hold the crowd, we worked with the STM and AMT to make sure there was ample transit to the Bell Centre.  Hotels all across the agglomeration were telling me that they were sold out for the whole week.  I knew we had to plan for everything.

 

FRANCOIS-XAVIER SEIGNEUR (Marketing): En tant qu'équipe, nous ne commercialisons l'événement un peu, bien que les Canadiens n'a pas tiré profit de l'événement. Nous avons utilisé ce mariage pour prouver que le hockey est favorable à des joueurs homosexuels. Tout du pull Tuxedo spéciale à une partie des bénéfices du jeu lui-même ont tous été donnés à l'organisation "You Can Play". Pour accueillir la foule qui venait pour un jeu et un mariage, nous avons dû vendre des billets pour veiller à ce que nous avions des sièges pour tout le monde. Je fus surpris d'apprendre que le jeu complet en moins de 2 minutes. L'énormité de l'événement est écroulé sur moi quand mon assistante m'a dit ces nouvelles. (SUBTITLE: As a team we did commercialize the event a little although the Canadiens did not profit from the event.  We used this wedding to prove that hockey is supportive of gay players. Everything from the special tuxedo sweater to a portion of the profits from the game itself were all donated to the "You can play" organization.  To accommodate the crowd that was coming for a game and a wedding, we had to sell tickets to ensure that we had seats for everyone.  I was surprised to hear that the game sold out in less than 2 minutes.  The enormity of the event came crashing down on me when my assistant told me this news.)

 

PATRICK BURKE (You Can Play):  Alex and Brendan approached me after a game against Toronto one night about a year ago and asked me about how to approach coming out in public in the NHL.  They said they were planning on getting married and wanted to make everything public before the wedding.  We worked with the Canadiens to plan the engagement during a game.  When Francois-Xavier told me that whatever profits came out of the wedding were going to be donated to us, the weight of me starting this organization came crashing down on me, I wept in memory of my brother.

 

SCOTT HEGGART (also from You Can Play):  I remember being on “Q” several years ago talking about my coming out process, and the talk turned to the effort it would take to get to have a professional NHL player come out.  I recall that it would take someone with tremendous courage.  I was watching Hockey Night in Canada, they highlighted the game between Boston and Montreal, and they went to commercial when Therrien called timeout late in the third.  I thought he was being a bonehead.  They played the one commercial and came right back to the game and showed what happened during the time out.  I was shocked to not only see 2 players come out, but get engaged and the crowd was cheering not booing.  I was awestruck, I hopped on the internet and was watching the outpouring of support on the Canadien’s twitter feed, there was some criticism too don’t get me wrong, but the generalized support meant we had made great strides in LGBTQ sports history.  It surprised me later on, when Alex and Brendan came to my house to personally deliver an invitation to the wedding.

 

BRENDAN:  Alex and I went out to Ottawa to visit a courageous young man named Scott Heggart.  Patrick at You Can Play helped us track him down.  We had seen his interview with Jian on “Q” and thought that we needed to be the NHL players he referenced in the interview.  Because of his inspiration, we felt we owed it to him to be at Bell Centre when we got married, so we personally went to his home near Ottawa to deliver the invitation just so he didn’t think the invitation was a joke when it came in the mail.

 

_The scene changes back to the preparations at Bell Centre for wedding day preparations_

 

NARRATOR:  The night before the biggest event creates a beehive of activity at Bell Centre.  The catering crew is making thousands of wedding cupcakes, over 30 thousand of them.  They are also starting work on the dinner buffet to be served to wedding guests in the suite level.

 

CATERING MANAGER: The PR arranged for this to be an episode of “Dinner Impossible”; we had a tall list of catering instructions beyond what we would normally use in one game. The catering list from Geoff included 30,000 cupcakes, 250 steaks, 250 baked sweet potatoes, 100 pounds of steamed broccoli, and a wedding cake.  Not your average game food list, but that is what the team asked for and we are here to serve.  The team doing the baking started at midnight and worked in shifts right up 6pm.  Robert Irvine was here helping with his crew, without it I don’t think we would have gotten this done!

 

GEOFF MOLSON: Nous avons vraiment donné l'équipage traiteur un gros travail à faire. Nos relations publiques les gens pensaient qu'il ferait pour un grand épisode de "Dinner Impossible". Nous avons pris contact avec l'équipe du chef Irvine et fait les arrangements.  (SUBTITLE: We really gave the catering crew a big job to do.  Our public relations people thought it would make for a great episode of "Dinner Impossible".  We got in touch with Chef Irvine's team and made the arrangements.)

 

ROBERT IRVINE:  Geoff Molson gave me a run for my money.  Montreal is a great food town and has several markets setup to get fresh food.  I ended up at Jean-Talon Market scouring for enough steak, sweet potatoes, and vegetables to feed an army.  Then there were the cupcakes for the fans, and the wedding cake.  I am not a pastry chef by any stretch, but the catering team really stepped it up and got it done.  We had 8 hours to prepare and cook for everybody, it was quite a rush.  I did get to meet Brendan and Alex, two men that have garnered more respect that I could ever imagine.  Their courage, poise, and charisma was very inspiring for me to do my best when they shocked me with having to make a vegetarian main course for a few special guests.

 

ICE TEAM MANAGER: We had about an hour to arrange carpets and chairs for the wedding guests on the ice.  Originally the team chaplain was going to stand on carpet too, but a change was made so he skated down the aisle too.  We could start any earlier than that hour because the carpet would freeze to the ice and we wouldn’t get it back off.

 

MICHEL LACROIX (announcer): Alex and Brendan challenged me to announce the wedding party as if it were the starting lineup for a game.  They wanted their guests to make the wedding feel more like a hockey game.  I was honored to help out.

 

VIDEO TEAM:  We were given the biggest production challenge ever; from the time of the wedding to the starting sequence of the game was about 3 hours.  We had to create a starting sequence of wedding highlights in a third of the time we get to do the starting sequence.  My team really had to step it up and they rose to the challenge beautifully.

 

NARRATOR:  At 3:30 on wedding day Bell Center opened its doors to the 20,250 people attending the wedding.  Everyone was seated in less than 30 minutes.  At 4pm, the wedding party was ready to head down the aisle.

 

MICHEL LACROIX:  Mesdames et Monseiurs, c’est mon plaisure introducer l’equipe du marriage.  À partir de but, notre aumônier ancien Canadien Doug Jarvis. Sur l'aile gauche soutenant Alex Galchenyuk sa sœur Anna Galchenyuk. Sur l'aile droite, soutenant Brendan Gallagher, chercheur Canadien de Montréal Nathan Beaulieu. Sur l'aile gauche soutenant Alex Galchenyuk, son père Alex Galchenyuk Sr. Sur l'aile droite soutenant Brendan Gallagher, son père Ian Gallagher. Sur l'aile gauche, le meilleur homme à Alex Galchenyuk, des Oilers d'Edmonton Nail Yapokov. Sur l'aile droite, le meilleur homme à Brendan Gallager, du Canadien de Montréal Josh Gorges. Au centre, accueillir les palefreniers ... Alex Galchenyuk et Brendan Gallagher. (SUBTITLE: Ladies and gentleman, it is my pleasure to introduce the wedding team.  Starting in goal, our chaplain former Canadien Doug Jarvis.  On left wing supporting Alex Galchenyuk his sister Anna Galchenyuk.  On right wing, supporting Brendan Gallagher, fellow Montreal Canadien Nathan Beaulieu.  On left wing supporting Alex Galchenyuk, his father Alex Galchenyuk Sr.  On right wing supporting Brendan Gallagher, his father Ian Gallagher.  On left wing, best man to Alex Galchenyuk, Edmonton Oiler Nail Yapokov.  On right wing, best man to Brendan Gallager, Montreal Canadien Josh Gorges.  At center, welcome the grooms... Alex Galchenyuk and Brendan Gallagher.)

 

DOUG: Dearly beloved we are finally gathered here today, although I wished this happened 2 seasons ago.  If any gathered on the ice have any objection to these two getting married today, please speak now or forever bottle it in.

 

_10 seconds of silence_

 

DOUG (continuing):  Brendan and Alex you have written your own promises to each other, please read them now.

 

BRENDAN: Alex we have been through a lot as a couple.  We have gone from keeping our relationship a secret to making it public, there were the injuries, the illnesses, and the long nights on the road.  I promise to be by your side with my support and my love when the days are good and when the days are bad.  I will do this for all time with my unwavering love.  This ring I am putting on your finger is a symbol of my never ending love.

 

ALEX:  Brendan in the last 3 years, I have helped you through a lot and you have done the same for me.  You have managed more medical emergencies than Carey Price.  I promise to be by your side through thick and thin with unwavering love and devotion no matter what silly circumstances you find yourself.  With this ring, I make this promise to you with my never-ending love.

 

DOUG:  I am now required to affirm your marriage in accordance with Quebec law.  Do you Alex Alexandrovich Galchenyuk take Brendan Adam Mathew Gallagher to be your husband under the covenants of marriage, promise your support to him, and make a home with him until death parts you?

 

ALEX: I will

 

DOUG: Do you Brendan Adam Mathew Gallagher take Alex Alexandrovich Galchenyuk to be your husband under the covenants of marriage, offer your support to him, and make a home with him until death parts you?

 

BRENDAN: I will.

 

DOUG:  Each of these hockey sticks is a symbol of the individual you are. I will now tape these sticks together, now taped together you are now a team, and you will shoot this puck into the goal. The goal represents the promises you have made together. Your promises in marriage are the key to its success and the goal of the relationship. You are forever interdependent.

 

_Brendan and Alex shoot their goal as planned, the horns go off in the arena._

 

DOUG:  Under the laws of the province of Quebec, I now finally get to pronounce you “The Gallys” at last.  Please make out and get it over with.

 

_Brendan and Alex get their first kiss as a married couple and skate back down the aisle._

NARRATOR:  Brendan and Alex along with the wedding guest they invited were ushered up to the Molson’s suite and two adjoining suites to watch the game and have a reception dinner.  Brendan and Alex’s last official duty of the night was to drop the puck for the game.

 

MICHEL LACROIX: Mesdames et Meseiurs, joindre à moi pour accueillir nos jeunes mariés Alex Galchenyuk and Brendan Gallagher. Ladies and Gentleman, join me in welcoming our newlyweds, Alex Galchenyuk and Brendan Gallagher.

 

MAX and JORDON EMERLE to Brendan and Alex:  Congratulations guys, that was an awesome wedding.

 

BRENDAN and ALEX: Thanks guys, ready to play?

 

_The puck is dropped to applause.  Brendan and Alex kiss once again to the crowd’s delight._

 

_The show ends with the credits at this point.  Using the highlight reel that starts that night’s game and some of the Kiss Cam footage that was obtained during the game._

**Author's Note:**

> I am not a screenwriter, but I hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to comment below.


End file.
